Russia's Purchase of Five Dolphins, to Be Trained for Warfare?

Usually when government awards military contracts it will be the acquisition of equipment including guns, missiles and aircraft engines. But this time, the Russia's Ministry of Defense purchased five dolphins without any explanation.

As reported by the NBC News, the United States and Soviet Union implement competing programs to train the mammals for military purposes, including torpedo and mine detection as well as the interception of underwater spies.  Dolphins however, are historically not a stranger to the militaries of worldwide superpowers.

If we look back to history, these bottlenose dolphins have the potential to be utilized for aquatic investigations and rescues which are something the Soviet Union had done during the cold war. There is also a possibility that these mammals will become killer machines as there are some dolphins trained last month to plant explosives on enemy ships, according to retired Col. Baranets who worked during the Cold War with military dolphins.

Whatever the dolphins' purpose is, Russia has been increasing its hunt for dolphins lately.  When Russia appended Crimea in 2014, it trained dolphins in the city of Sevastopol since the 1960's without disclosed information. However, the Defense Ministry contradicted reports that dolphins were being trained to kill, based on the New York Daily News report.

The Navy warns on its website for the training program: "Since dolphins cannot discern the difference between enemy and friendly vessels, or enemy and friendly divers and swimmers, it would not be wise to give that kind of decision authority to an animal. The animals are trained to detect, locate, and mark all mines or all swimmers in an area of interest or concern, and are not trained to distinguish between what we would refer to as good or bad."

According to Metro, the dolphins are scheduled to be delivered to Sevastopol in Crimea by August 1. The ministry bought the dolphins for £18,000 and will be supplied by Moscow's Utrish Dolphinarium. The deal composed of three male and female dolphins aged three to five years old with all teeth intact and no mucus from the blowhole.  

Russia claimed that it has no plans of using dolphins for military purposes aside from psychological and stress therapy.  

Tags

Russia, bottlenose dolphins, navy, Cold War

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